Computing devices are becoming ever more ubiquitous. With the Internet of Things, even basic appliances, such as washing machines and refrigerators, are incorporating processors and software that would not long ago have been considered quite sophisticated. Thus, more and more of people's day to day activities involve computing devices. Increasingly, people desire and need to carry out activities involving, and between, multiple computing devices. For example, a user may wish to display content from a tablet computing device or smartphone on a computer monitor or smart television.
Traditionally, for devices to communicate with each other, they were required to detect and pair with one another. For example, devices using the Bluetooth® standard are able to automatically sense one another, and pair, after a user carries out an initial pairing step. However, existing methods for pairing devices can require significant user interaction, may have specific hardware requirements or limitations, and may not be able to adequately determine which devices should be paired when multiple candidates exist. Thus, there is room for improvement in technologies related to automated recognition and selection.